[Nettime-nl] Oranjelol / Orange Jinks!

[Tjebbe van Tijen via Chello <t.tijen@chello.nl>]

Oranjelol (Orange Jinks!) is getting drunk publicly in support of the  
royal House of Orange, a yearly event in the Netherlands on April the  
30th. This quick & dirty collage is made on 'the day after' the first  
of May, having seen the workmen cleaning the mass of debris left by  
the partying crowd in the center of Amsterdam, where I happen to  
live. The picture elements are from left to right: a drawing  
published in 1894 in the October issue of an early socialist paper  
"De Roode Duivel" (the red devil) by Louis Hermans (1861 - 1943) and  
reads: "Famous Temporaries: Lady Ka Flower Pot from Utrecht preparing  
herself for an Orange Jink (on the table a bottle of a cheap liqueur  
called 'Orange Bitter'); next a mix of two Flickr photo-reportage  
pictures from the yearly Queens party on the Magere Brug (meagre  
bridge) over the Amstel river in Amsterdam with a drunken crowd and a  
blasting disco (2007; the parties look the same each year so why  
bother to find one for 2009?). Commentary in 1894 by Hermans on the  
Orange craze and the success of the Dutch new royals (the Kingdom has  
been established by Von Metternich's Wiener Congress in 1814): "..an  
astonishing success, which can be understood easily because most  
members of the thinking part' of the nation have as much brains in  
their head as the ass of the devil."

The systematic policy of constant centering public attention on  
herself and her family by the Dutch Queen - who firmly believes "her  
task" is a godgiven one - showed yesterday (April 30 2009) its mirror  
side in the unwanted attention of a suicidal man who performed his  
yet unclear attack on an Orangist crowd and possibly the royal family  
- doing their waving from an open bus during a royal entry into the  
city of Apeldoorn. On the same day drunken crowds swarmed the street  
and canals of Amsterdam. In spite of the speed of news of modern  
media the public display of pleasure went on for several hours after  
the alleged attentat; the happy crowd wanted their party first of  
all. For the non Dutch - this alcoholistic euphoria is only a new  
tradition which has developed during the reign of Queen Beatrix  
starting in the mid eighties when supporters of the national football  
team manifested their support more and more through their public  
drinking habbits and dressing up in all sorts of orange  
paraphernalia. Critical distance as existed during the sixties and  
seventies toward a system of a hereditary kingdom, slowly evaporated.  
This was caused by the creation of a national football fever during  
international competitions: clad in orange and fed by endless amounts  
of beer. Commercial interests from beer companies and bar-owners  
combined with the acclaim of local authorities for this new Dutch  
nationalism which for them seemed to be a way out of the antagonizing  
effects of the multi-cultural society of the Netherlands. The  
partying under the orange banner seems to reunite what has been  
broken up.

A new national consciousness without any real political content,  
purely based on having a jolly good time together. When one observes  
the loud orange crowds pouring into the inner city streets of the  
main towns, one may smell other sentiments: this is suburbia taking  
over the city, you better join in and be happy with them and you  
better do not show any disapproval of the bad behaviour of throwing  
debris, public pissing, and shouting. I have not yet seen statistics  
on which percentage of the crowd is just merry and mellow and whether  
the aggressive ones are a mere minority. My impression is that the  
same group of persons may cycle during the day through all this  
behavioural stages depending on their intake of drugs, food and level  
of endurance during their pleasure drifting between the ultra loud  
music stages spread all over town. Just over half a million orange  
party-goers left thousands of kilos of tins, broken bottles and  
plastic cups all over town. Bar owners and free tstreet traders have  
made their big buck and leave their debris to the municipal workmen.  
Like real royals the orangist crowd have partied and left their shit  
behind for the servants to clean up. That is today the first of May,  
indeed a sad sight: orange Jinks!.

Tjebbe van Tijen

Image/Plaatje via

http://imaginarymuseum.org/
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